For all the online chatter about which songs are about which exes on Taylor Swift's new album, The Tortured Poets Department, the only people seemingly not talking about 'TTPD' are the actual exes. That is, until today.
A paparazzi caught up with 1975 frontman Matty Healy on the street and asked how he would "rate your Taylor diss-track compared to the 30 others." Confused, Healy repeated "my diss-track?" to which the cameraman clarified he meant Swift's song about Healy.
"I haven't really listened to that much of it, but I'm sure it's good," Healy replied good-naturedly as he continued walking down the street in a nondescript outfit that included a navy zip-up hoodie and black backpack.
The album's title track is widely believed to be about Healy, who dated Swift between April and June of 2023. In the song "The Tortured Poets Department," Swift sings, "You left your typewriter at my apartment / Straight from the tortured poets department / I think some things I never say / Like, 'Who uses a typewriter anyway?'"
A number of other tracks are believed to be about Healy as well, including "But Daddy I Love Him," "Guilty as Sin?," and "I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)," but one song in particular, "The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived," is especially pointed in its barbs.
"'Cause once your queen had come / You treat her like an also-ran / You didn't measure up / In any measure of a man," Swift wrote.
Later on, she sings "In fifty years will all this be declassified?/ And you'll confess why you did it / And I'll say good riddance / 'Cause it wasn't sexy once it wasn't forbidden."
And while some in Healy's camp -- namely his aunt -- have spoken out since Swift released her surprise double-album on April 19, the British singer had not before now.
Swift and Healy reportedly dated briefly following her split from British actor Joe Alwyn, with whom she had a six-year relationship. Many of the songs on Swift's Reputation and Lover albums are believed to be about Alwyn, and he also collaborated with her, cowriting songs like "Exile," "Champagne Problems," and "Evermore" under the pseudonym William Bowery. In 2021, Alwyn won a Grammy when Swift's Folklore won Album of the Year.
Fans widely believed that much of Swift's first album after their breakup would be about Alwyn, especially when she announced its title. The Tortured Poets Department appeared to be a play on the "Tortured Man Club," a group chat that Alwyn and fellow actors Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott had started as a reference to their roles in Sally Rooney films.
Songs on 'TTPD' that are believed to be about Alwyn include "So Long, London," "loml," "I Can Do It With a Broken Heart," and "The Black Dog."
"Expressing herself through her music has always been therapeutic for Taylor," a source told ET. "It gives an outlet to move forward, feel empowered and turn her experiences into art."
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